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Halt O'Carrick
Halt is a highly qualified Ranger, and Will's mentor. Although being described as grim and unfriendly, he has a soft side when it comes to the people that he cares about. Originally from Hibernia, he escaped to Araluen at a young age. He is famous throughout all of Araluen for his mysterious ways and seemingly unstoppable nature. Appearance His beard is bushy, and his dark eyes are steady and unwavering. He has also been described as someone who is twice the size of man and as strong as a bear, although it is not proven if he really is indeed as strong as one, and is described as being quite short and thin in book one. He is very strong due to his arms being toned through the years of training with the longbow. Halt is a very good tactician and master stratagem, able to hold the Temujai forces off and force them to retreat while being outnumbered four to one with the help of Araluen slaves in Skandia and Will. Personality Although looking grim, pitiless and ruthless, Halt is actually very humorous (in a very sarcastic way) as well as caring, especially for his apprentice Will. Halt is, in fact, a very kind man, but not necessarily a "fair" man. Overall, however, Halt has a grim, sarcastic know-all sense of humour, but does feel that his former apprentice, Will, is like a son. Halt can often be very stubborn and doesn't often let his true emotions show. If someone whom he cares about is insulted or hurt in some manner he will quickly take offence as shown in ''The Burning Bridge'' when a foolish knight insults the Ranger and Diplomatic corps and also Baron Arald. He ended up being thrown into a moat. History His legendary status also comes from the fact that it was he who have seemingly implanted the fear of horses to the Wargals. In the battle of Hackham Heath during the Morgarath's rebellion, he led a large force of Araluen cavalry through a secret ford and ambushed Morgarath's army, relieving the beleaguered Araluen main force and routing Morgarath's army. The few surviving Wargals created a fear of horses among further generations. At this time a man called Daniel saved Halt from a guaranteed death when he was cornered by Wargals. This man gave his life to spare Halt's and in return Halt protected his son, Will, and took him to Redmont to live in the castle ward until Will showed skills of a Ranger. Halt is best friends with Crowley, the Ranger Corps Commander and they both get along very well, Crowley also is able to poke fun at Halt. Their friendship developed when they were young rangers and they are known to have revitalized the Ranger Corps and just after that period Halt and Crowley soon began to build on the legends of the Rangers by defeating a evil bandit. This is discussed in the short story, The Hibernian, in Ranger's Apprentice: The Lost Stories. Halt is also one of King Duncan's most trusted advisers and the King is saddened when he has to banish Halt for a year in The Icebound Land, after Halt publicly insults him so he could go after Will who had been kidnapped by Skandians in the events of book two. Halt is grieved by this also though he tried not to let it show (as ever). Halt is also an enemy of Temujai as he "borrowed" a breeding herd of their horses so that the Rangers have their horses today, and he also learned to make a recurve bow during his stay with them. Not much is known about the period he spent with the Temu'j apart from that he fought alongside and also against them. His skills with his weapons are so legendary and skillful that even if he claims that he had missed his shot, everyone knows he had hit it. His Longbow is larger than that of most Rangers', as in Halt's Peril, book 9, Will states his longbow is " One of the heaviest he'd seen, and even the strongest man, without proper technique could only bring it to half draw". He is likely the most skilled of all the Rangers. He is described as being slightly more accurate and a faster shooter than his former apprentice, Will, who is a better shot than Crowley and Gilan. However, Will is said to be nearly as skilled as his mentor, and may even surpass him with more training, which Halt himself has claimed. The Ruins of Gorlan In the first book Halt takes on Will as an apprentice after the young boy is rejected as an apprentice to all the other craftmasters. At first Will is a little daunted by the legendary figure but they soon warm to one another. When Halt takes Will to the annual Ranger gathering they meet up with Halt's former apprentice and Gilan and Will soon form a good friendship. When they arrive at the clearing the Rangers use for the gathering they discover that Morgarath and his Wargals are on the move and they have also employed two Kallkara, a viscious creature that resembles something out of a nightmare. Will, Halt and Gilan together track the animals out onto the plains. Halt realives that to take on the Kalkara someone must go for help from Redmont. He sends Will because he's the lightest with some reluctance and Gilan gives Will Blaze so Tug can be spelled for part of the journey. While Will rides off for help Halt aims for Castle Gorlan, the ruins of Morgarath's old fort. He leads the Kalkara there and tries to hold them off while he waits for help. He soon realises that the Kalkara, aren't, as he initially thought, after King Duncan or Baron Arald, but him. Due to a grudge Morgarath bears against Halt for bringing about the downfall of his army. Halt manages to kill one of the creatures using his longbow but the other still comes for him. Just as it is about to get Halt Sir Rodney and Baron Arald appear on the scene and help to fight off the other animal, Halt is however knocked unconscious by one of the animals and Arald soon becomes injured. Seeing that the men are about to be killed, Will, who is watching from a distance shoots at the Kalkara with a fiery arrow which destroys the beast. At the end of the book Arald offers Will the oppertunity to become a battleschool trainee but Will declines the offer in favour of being a Ranger. Hatl is pleased by this and for the first time smiles at Will. He later gives his apprentice a bronze oakleaf, signifying his offical entrance into the corps as an apprentice and tells him about his father. The Kings of Clonnmel In book 8, it is revealed that Halt is the twin brother to King Ferris of Clonmel (he also has a sister, Caitlyn, who had died before the book took place). Halt is actually seven minutes older than his brother and therefore should have been the king. However, Ferris believed that the throne was rightfully his, and tried to murder Halt three times. The first time was with poison, but he got the amounts of the poison wrong. He also tried to to crush Halt beneath a pile of bricks, he narrowly missed and succeeded in badly cutting and injuring Halts' leg, and tried to drown him while they were salmon fishing. Halt escaped to Araluen where he later became a Ranger. Later, he returns to Clonmel to convince his brother to defeat the Outsiders, a sinister cult who wants to control all of Hibernia and then Araluen. Though Halt and Ferris are identical twins, there are some major differences. Where Halt is 'lean and tough as a whipcord', Ferris is a bit overweight and rather soft. Halt has salt and pepper hair and a rough, full beard and Ferris wears a goatee and keeps his dyed black hair drawn back with a leather band. Because he dyed his hair black, Ferris looks at least ten years younger than his brother. Ferris is killed by a Genovesan, a foreign assassin, and he and the false prophet, Tennyson flee the country. Halt is slightly saddened by his brother's death but soon get's over it and is soon back to making sarcastic remarks. Halt's Peril In Halt's Peril, Halt is poisoned by an arrow from one of the Genovesan assassin's crossbows. Will goes to fetch Malcom, a highly skilled healer who appeared in books five and six. Malcolm heals Halt and along with Horace they all travel to the village where Tennyson is preaching and trap him in a large cavern where he is holding a 'prayer-meeting' with the villagers he has deceived. Will, Halt, Horace and Malcolm ambush him and he is killed by Will who throws some of Malcolm's iodine-based smoke bombs at him. The Lost Stories Halt appears in the following stories from book 11 of the Ranger's Apprentice series: Death of a Hero, The Hibernian, Purple Prose, the Inkwell and the Dagger, the Bridal Dance and And About Time Too . . . The fist story, called Death of a Hero tells how Daniel came to save his life during the battle against Morgarath and the Wargals and how Will's mother really died. In the Hibernian, it is revealed how Halt came to be a Ranger and how he became friends with Crowley. Relationships (front) and Horace (back right).]]Halt isn't the sort of person people would imagine to be romantic. However, he had been in love with Lady Pauline for a long time. Crowley also was in love with her secretly be he didn't say anything as he guessed something was going on between Halt and her. They are married in ''Erak's Ransom'' at a lavish and large wedding (to Halt's displeasure). Skills Archery: Halt is an extraordinary archer. He proves this through many missions throughout his life. He also passes on his extraordinary talent through his former apprentices Gilan and Will. Hidden & unseen movement: Like all Rangers, Halt is extremely talented in unseen movement. He trained Gilan who is thought to be the best at this in the whole Corps. Saxe Knife and Throwing Knife Skills:He is a master knife thrower and is presumably good at the double knife defense. Tactical Thinking Skills:Halt has experienced and faced many problems and challenges in his life. Those experiences help him solve almost any problem that he comes across. Halt's thinking skills are looked up to by many people and even fellow Rangers, who think that he can solve anything. Trivia *Halt is the Ranger of Redmont Fief. *He is said to be short. *He is often thought to be huge and muscular, not short and wiry. This leads villagers and commoners to not accept him being who he says he is. *Halt gets seasick for the first few hours on a ship, or during rough sailing. It's actually funny because he seems so infallible. * Category:Humans Category:Araluen Category:Rangers Category:Males Category:The Ruins of Gorlan characters Category:The Burning Bridge characters Category:The Icebound Land characters Category:The Battle for Skandia characters Category:The Sorcerer in the North characters Category:The Seige of Macindaw characters Category:Erak's Ransom characters Category:The Kings of Clonmel characters Category:Halt's Peril characters Category:Protagonists Category:Main Characters Category:The Emperor of Nihon-Ja Characters Category:Characters Category:Royalty Category:Princes Category:Hibernians Category:The Lost Stories Characters Category:Death of a Hero Characters Category:The Inkwell and the Dagger Characters Category:The Roamers Characters Category:Purple Prose Characters Category:The Bridal Dance Characters Category:The Hibernian Characters Category:And About Time, Too... Characters Category:Male Rangers Category:Clonmelans